In this sermon we begin a series inspired by a book called What Makes You Come Alive: A Spiritual Walk With Howard Thurman by Lerita Coleman Brown. We use Thurman’s famous quote to jumpstart our reflections on what it means to live in the spirit of the resurrection. [The quote: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is more people who have come alive.”] In this sermon we talk about what it means to experience the presence off God in the Eucharist, how that is primary means by which we nurture our communion with God even though, as I share from my own life, we might experience holy coincidences or moments of divine intervention in strange ways.

In this sermon we begin a series inspired by a book called What Makes You Come Alive: A Spiritual Walk With Howard Thurman by Lerita Coleman Brown. We use Thurman’s famous quote to jumpstart our reflections on what it means to live in the spirit of the resurrection. [The quote: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is more people who have come alive.”] In this sermon we talk about Thurman’s experience of Halley’s Comet and what his Mom taught him there, Brennan Manning’s words about grace, Jesus’ questions to Peter and how he never stops asking them, about what it means to know that you belong to God and how that is at the center of the journey of faith.

Good morning, Santa Monica Nazarene -

I’m here with another audio recording of my weekly Call to Worship email. And today I wanted to share a quote from J.R.R. Tolkien’s second book in The Lord of the Rings series (the book’s called The Two Towers, in case you were wondering). But it’s a quote I’ve been thinking about ever since I read it that I think might help us prepare our hearts for worship today.

To set the stage a little bit… at this point in the story, Sam and Frodo are reflecting on how far they’ve travelled in their journey to destroy the Ring of Power. (It’s okay if you don’t know what that means. Just know that that’s the main goal—destroying the ring of power—and that it requires a long and dangerous journey to do so.)

But there’s this moment when Sam starts reflecting on what it means to go on an adventure. And I love what he says. It’s kind of a long paragraph, but it’s really good. And so he says,

“And we should’t be here at all, if we’d known more about it before we started. But I suppose it’s often that way. The brave things in the old tales and songs, Mr. Frodo: adventures as I used to call them. I used to think that they were things the wonderful folk of the stories went out and looked for, because they wanted them, because they were exciting, and life was a bit dull, a kind of sport, as you might say. But that’s not the way of it with the tales that really mattered, or the ones that stay in the mind. Folk seem to have been just landed in them, usually—their paths were laid that way, as you put it. But I expect they had lots of chances, like us, of turning back, only they didn’t . . .”

Sam is maturing a bit, here, in his thinking about what it means to go on an adventure. His younger mind saw adventure as something you pursued because life was boring. However, now he understands that adventure sometimes finds you all on its own and you have to then decide whether you’ll embrace it and go on the journey.

As I think about this quote, I like the idea that we are dropped into stories. That adventure finds us. That life finds us. And we have to decide whether to embrace it and to go on the journey. It makes me think about God and creation and what it means to be alive. That we are dropped into the story of God and that God is calling us onto a journey towards communion with him.

There’s always some mystery to the life of faith. We’re called to follow Jesus, but the details of that journey aren’t known to us. And we can always choose to turn back. Or we can be like Sam and Frodo and venture out further and come to discover more and more that the good tales never end, as they say, and that we actually want to be a part of them.

As you prepare your heart for worship, I pray you would know that when you woke up today you landed in the greatest of all stories and that it is calling to you.

See you at 10:30am for worship!

Grace and Peace,

Pastor Scott

In this sermon we begin a series inspired by a book called What Makes You Come Alive: A Spiritual Walk With Howard Thurman by Lerita Coleman Brown. We use Thurman’s famous quote to jumpstart our reflections on what it means to live in the spirit of the resurrection. [The quote: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is more people who have come alive.”] This sermon we consider how nature teaches us that God is a refuge by consider the idea of refugia in nature.

In this sermon we begin a series inspired by a book called What Makes You Come Alive: A Spiritual Walk With Howard Thurman by Lerita Coleman Brown. We use Thurman’s famous quote to jumpstart our reflections on what it means to live in the spirit of the resurrection. [The quote: “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do that, because what the world needs is more people who have come alive.”] This sermon revolves around the importance of silence in our communion with God. We’ll talk about the desert fathers, a book of dopamine, another book about someone’s search for the quietest place on earth, and how our bodies play music.

In this sermon on Resurrection Sunday we continue our series looking at the seven things Jesus says from the cross before he dies. We look at the seventh and last thing where in death he entrusts himself to the Father. We consider this through the lens of breath in the Scripture, particulalry in light of Jesus giving is spirit to them after the resurrection in John 20.

In this sermon we continue our series looking at the seven things Jesus says from the cross before he dies. We look at the fifth thing where he says that he is thirsty.

Good morning, SaMoNaz -

I wanted to do something a little different today. Usually I send an email with a brief reflection to help us prepare for the worship gathering. But today I thought I would also made it available in audio in hopes that maybe if you can’t sit down to read something today, you can listen to it while you make breakfast or putter around the house this morning.

For now I’m calling this a one-off audio, but who knows. Maybe it’ll stick.

And so for today, I wanted to share a couple of quotes as we prepare for the worship gathering and then a small reflection all of which shouldn’t take more than a couple of minutes.

One quote is from Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the other is from Soren Kierkegaard.

Bonhoeffer says, “The cross is not the terrible end to an otherwise god-fearing and happy life, but it meets us at the beginning of our communion with Christ.”

And Kierkegaard says, “The difference between an admirer and a follower still remains, no matter where you are. The admirer never makes any true sacrifices. He always plays it safe. Though in words, phrases, songs, he is inexhaustible about how highly he prizes Christ, he renounces nothing, gives up nothing, will not reconstruct his life, will not be what he admires, and will not let his life express what it is he supposedly admires.”

What I like about the Bonhoeffer quote this is how the cross is not an accessory to the Christian life, but the essence. To know Christ (and, thus, to know God) is to know him as crucified. There is no real communion with Christ other than with him on the cross.

What I like about the Kierkegaard quote is the recognition that there are admirers of Jesus who are not truly followers.

Both of these quotes are quite sobering in our North American culture where it is quite easy to identify as a Christian without the need to actually follow or imitate Christ. What further complicates this is that sides have formed about with means to follow Christ.

I write this partly in hopes that we might recognize if and when we slide into admiration of Christ when the going gets tough. But maybe even more importantly that we remember the cross does not mean all things to all people. It means something particular of the one who was crucified in the social, political, economic, and religious context of his day. Our witness as the church depends on being able to see this coherently and truthfully.

Palm Sunday is a time to remember this as the people wave branches and shout Hosanna at Jesus as he rides into Jerusalem, people who are perhaps not quite so aware that he—he who is the least of these, the poor one with no place to lay his head, who offended religious bureaucrats for loving their power more than people, who makes a way of inclusion for the marginalized, who makes is easier for the voiceless to be heard, who says renounce your privilege and sell all you have if the rising tide benefits you but not another, he who stares relentlessly into our eyes asking who do you say that I am?—this is the one riding to the cross and calling them and us to follow.

See you at 10:30am for worship.

Grace and Peace,

Pastor Scott